


i'll be with you (still)

by Chromathesia



Series: fh fics by chrom [1]
Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series), Fantasy High, Fantasy High: Sophomore Year - Fandom
Genre: 5+1 Things, F/F, and i hope you all agree with me, i would die for figayda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-29
Updated: 2020-05-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:53:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24446902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chromathesia/pseuds/Chromathesia
Summary: or: five times that ayda has met figueroth faeth and the one time that fig met ayda aguefort
Relationships: Adaine Abernant & Aelwen Abernant, Adaine Abernant & Ayda Aguefort, Adaine Abernant & Figueroth Faeth, Aelwen Abernant & Ayda Aguefort, Aelwen Abernant & Figueroth Faeth, Ayda Aguefort/Figueroth Faeth
Series: fh fics by chrom [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1782916
Comments: 8
Kudos: 77





	i'll be with you (still)

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from "Oh Ana" by Mother Mother.
> 
> To clarify: each of Ayda's sections is from the pov of a different iteration of Ayda. She only remembers what her previous iterations have written in diary entries and notes.

**_1\. anachronism_ **

According to Ayda's diary entries, she did not like her father but she admired his intellect. Arthur Aguefort was widely known in Spire for both the mark he left on history and the high level of wizardry he achieved in his centuries of life. What he wasn't known for was copulating with a phoenix that then somehow mothered her. She was hidden away like a shame, a mark on his perfection.

In between all of that, Arthur Aguefort also mastered the art of chronomancy.

During this reiteration of her life, she is determined to do the same.

In her twenty-fifth year in that form, Ayda finds an ancient text squirreled away in the back of the Compass Points (none of her notes told her which version of herself had buried it back there) containing a most intriguing ritual circle. After a week of preparation, Ayda finally feels prepared enough to attempt the complex spell. It isn't even a spell, really; it's a bending of the arcane to direct her where she wishes to go, anywhere in the fabric of time and space itself, for fifteen minutes.

She isn't sure where to ask for. A tiny voice in the back of her head whispers, _'A time during which I feel happy.'_

The chalk of the magic circle stirs up in a maelstrom that swirls around her, and Ayda covers her eyes almost instinctually. She feels the powdered talc spraying against her, as though she is standing in the middle of a sandstorm, and soon afterwards she feels a warmth.

When Ayda opens her eyes, she finds herself in a park. There are trees, and she is on land. It is fascinating to her; she had never spent that much time on land. She takes a cautious step forwards and her knee collapses, her sea legs fighting against her. She stumbles and trips.

"Hey lady, are you okay?"

Ayda looks up to see a young girl, perhaps around twelve years old, of clearly elven descent standing above her. She is toned a reddish-tan and her hair is braided back neatly, and she is wearing a bright purple dress that complements her well. She stares at Ayda with inquisitive green eyes.

"I believe all of my bones are intact and only my pride is hurt. I am fine, thank you. And I am not a lady. I am a half-phoenix."

The girl blinks, cocks her head to the side, opens her mouth as though to say something, pauses, shrugs. "Alright," she says.

"Figueroth Faeth! Don't run off like that without telling us, missy!"

The girl turns and makes a face towards a harried woman that also wears her face. "Sorry, Mom!" she yells. She turns back to Ayda. "I'm glad you're okay. Bye!"

Ayda stares after the girl, uncertain of how to respond. A few minutes later, she feels the grainy wind of the chalk dust again, a phantom breeze now, and she blinks and finds herself back in the Compass Points. She tries the spell again, but she can no longer harness the magics that she used to whisk herself away.

That day, she destroys all of her diary notes, sets the book of chronomancy ablaze, and uses Sending to tell Arthur Aguefort one last thing: "Never contact me, ever again."

_(Fig doesn't really remember the lady in the park that clearly; all she remembers from that day is that her family had a picnic and Gilear spilled an entire container of rice and beans on himself, and Sandralynn and Fig had both laughed so hard, and how that was perhaps the last good memory she had of her intact family before her horns started growing in.)_

* * *

**_2\. patron_ **

The first thing that Ayda remembers is Figueroth Faeth, her guardian, smiling at her with a love that she did not think she would ever understand. Even years later, while reading the notes from her predecessor on meeting Fig and how wonderful she was, Ayda cannot believe that such a being would deign herself to help Ayda. Figueroth is proud and stands tall, unconcerned as she shouts to the world her message of rebellion from behind a guitar. Ayda could never have ensnared her. It just doesn't make sense.

It seems that Figueroth did not think the same, for when Ayda gets to a knee and prostrates herself in front of Figueroth in her thirteenth year in that form, she is frozen in shock.

"You want me to be your patron?" the archdevil repeats.

"You are grand, wonderful, beautiful," Ayda says, not daring to make eye contact with the being that raised her, loved her, when she did not have to. She doesn’t know what those green eyes would betray to her, and she does not want to find out. "I could not repay my debt in any other way."

"There's no debt, you don't have to--"

"Figueroth the Infaethable, I offer myself to you," Ayda says shortly, bowing back down.

"I don't want-- Ayda, damn it, get back up, you don't have to do this! I just want you to be _loved_ , you don't have to worry about anything else besides that. The archdevil thing is just a _job_ , y'know--"

"You are great," Ayda says, finally looking up to Figueroth, "and I could not admire you more. I would be happiest serving you in this way."

Figueroth stares at her with an emotion that Ayda could not begin to process, even using the spell Comprehend Subtext. "Are you sure?" she asks hesitantly.

Ayda nods as emphatically as she can, and years later when she has truly fallen for Figueroth and truly understands that Figueroth loves her just as unconditionally, she bears that shared power proudly to the world.

_(Fig wonders if this is how her father felt when she asked to be his warlock. Somehow, she doesn't think so.)_

* * *

**_3\. mythos_ **

Ayda had been raised on legends of Figueroth the Infaethable, told to her by her caretakers.

"Fig's always been a fan of telling tales, but never with you," Adaine had said on more than one occasion, "and that was because she loved you with every fiber of her being. Truly, it was disgusting, actually." The Oracle could weave tales of Figueroth's bravery and her devotion, as well as her stubbornness and impulsiveness.

"She's always been a punk of a kid, but I don't remember seeing her angry at you, ever." Aelwyn had far fewer stories of the archdevil of rebellion, but what she did have to say were precious nuggets of pure information that Ayda hoarded in her brain, not spiced with the nostalgia that Adaine's memories always seemed to drip with. "She wrote you a song, once. Disgustingly saccharine, if you ask me, but you seemed to like it."

So when Fig herself appeared, not looking a day older than seventeen, in ripped jeans with a leather jacket and a black crop top, Ayda had thought herself ready.

"You are Figueroth Faeth," she states when she saw the tiefling lounging in a chair. Ayda eyes the feather that dangles from her right ear lobe. Figueroth raises an eyebrow, but before she could reply, Ayda says, "I'm Ayda Aguefort. The Oracle and her sister say that you are to be my paramour."

Figueroth barks out a laugh that tastes humorless. "Is that what they said?"

"That's what I've been told. I've been told many things about you, actually," Ayda says. "Tales of your journeys through hell and the Forest of the Nightmare King. How you left a gathering to speak only with me. How you played a guitar for me and helped me understand myself. That's what another Ayda said as well. But you must already know about the other Aydas."

Figueroth looks at her strangely as she states all of this. "How do you feel about knowing all of that?"

Ayda is thrown off by the question. "How am I supposed to feel?"

"You should know that better than I do," Figueroth says, stretching her legs out. "Tell me, how do you feel about me? How do you feel about having an archdevil as a paramour, Ayda?"

Ayda does not have a response.

_("You can't leave already," Adaine says disbelievingly. "She's been waiting for you for nineteen years. She asks about you every day. She's been trying to learn guitar to impress you, for crying out loud." Boggy croaks from his place on her shoulder, eyeing Fig with his I-don't-know-about-this look._

_"That's not my Ayda," Fig responds quietly, and she can feel the ember of a tear streak down her cheek as she thinks back to the half-phoenix she met on Leviathan, many decades ago now. "She's trying to be my Ayda, but she can't be. She has to be her own Ayda, and I don't know how to get her to understand that."_

_"More than a hundred years and you're still horrible at communication," Aelwyn says over a cup of bitter, herbal tea. "Tell her that, you idiot.")_

* * *

**_4\. headliner_ **

Ayda isn't sure why her caretakers brought her to this concert. Aelwyn didn't quite mesh with the crowd as well, but Adaine seems to fit right in, though how she did so without the dark clothing and plentiful piercings that Ayda observes on their fellow concert-goers she did not know. A band that Ayda does not think plays well is screeching on stage, hopping up and down as they attack their instruments with fervor.

 _"Won't they break their guitars?"_ Ayda asks Adaine via Message.

 _"Nah, they're probably magically bolstered,"_ Adaine responds. _"We only need to stick around for a little bit more."_

Ayda tries to figure out what Adaine could mean without expending a spell slot for Comprehend Subtext when the band suddenly says, "Thank you, Elmville! And now, we have the pleasure of introducing: THE INFAETHABLE HERSELF!"

Fireworks go off, whizzing into the sky as the crowd screams in anticipation, and Ayda feels Aelwyn tense up beside her. She watches Adaine reach over to hold her sister's shoulder; Aelwyn relaxes at that and nods to Adaine in thanks.

Ayda doesn't notice anything else because a figure enflamed has appeared on stage.

Whoever is playing now doesn't just amaze Ayda with their effects. They strut out of a portal of flame, a smirk stretched across their face, piercings and necklaces and horn-rings shimmering burnished as they reflect a light that seems to come from within the figure. She's radiant and beautiful and powerful and unstoppable, and Ayda's breath catches in the back of her throat.

Somehow, she feels as though the Infaethable is staring right at her (and Adaine and Aelwyn, obviously). She feels Adaine raise an arm to simply wave and then point at the Infaethable, who pauses before her smirk shifts into a smile now that makes something in Ayda glow.

She had read her predecessors' notes, of course, of how the Infaethable had come to her and touched her life and tried to make it better in iterations past. How the Infaethable had told her that she did not want to ruin their relationship, about how sorry she was that she couldn't handle raising Ayda herself after the first attempt had destroyed her. How Adaine had previously been her best friend and the person that understood her inside and out and about how she hoped that Adaine could help her better than she every could, what with her grief for her own original Ayda being tied to the new ones that came after.

Figueroth stares directly at Ayda and begins to sing a song that Ayda had memorized from her notes, underneath a carefully penned quote: _'It's about a phoenix, and whoever she touches is reborn better.'_

Ayda can feel tears streaming down her face as she absorbs everything that Figueroth is and was and her heart flutters and she feels whole again.

_(Fig had almost forgotten that she asked Adaine to make sure Ayda was there for the Elmville concert. When she sees her from across the hall, it feels like everything is right again and that the entire world has been put back in place, and when she sings, she tastes the love and passion that she screams with every word.)_

* * *

**_5\. dazzled_ **

Ayda has the feeling that wasn't actually Rawlins, but she finds that she doesn't really care when thinking of the girl that appeared for a brief second.

The half-orc had been a wonderful surprise, a truly inspiring wizard to behold, but the tiefling was more special still. She was perhaps the first honest person that Ayda could recall meeting; even their elven wizard friend, though very genuine, had to take a moment to peel back layers for Ayda to read (and she was thankful that the elf had). It seemed that the tiefling didn't have layers to remove, but layers to apply, and she was intrigued by that. Fascinated, to be completely honest.

It seemed like that tiefling was one of the elf's personal best friends as well. Perhaps by being Adaine's friend, she would get to know who that girl was much better.

* * *

**_1\. pinion_ **

When Fig first meets Ayda Aguefort in the Compass Points, a tingling, dizzying shudder dances through her chest and she stares at her. There is an intensity and an honesty in Ayda's gaze that demands the same from her, and for the first time, even with all of the middle-aged men, Fig is entranced, and she feels her heart taking flight.

_(At the end of this reiteration, Ayda hands Fig all of her notes from previous lives._

_"I do not want to remember a history that you did not exist in, Figueroth Faeth," she whispers. "I'm sure I will want to read these again, though, so destroying them is not prudent."_

_Fig hiccups around her tears and simply nods, trying to summon an easy smirk from somewhere. "You got it, babe," she says quietly, reaching out to just hold Ayda's hand.)_

**Author's Note:**

> Do y'all ever think about how only Fig, Ayda, Adaine, and Aelwyn might live for more than a century from the original Bad Kids + Co.? Because I sure do, every twenty minutes or so.
> 
> Anyhow, hope you liked the Figayda, more gay stories coming soon


End file.
